From the fun song, “Boys a liar” by PinkPantheress playing every other grade, to the beach balls being passed around the audience, this year’s airband really got Bishops students excited. Ms. Birder (‘07) explained, “I remember loving to go watch the airband pieces when I was in high school.” And this year was no different, she added, “airband was a lot of fun!” As Emma Donnelly (‘25) and Katelyn Wang (‘23) said, airband is a small but important step to increasing school spirit on campus, and it’s one of those experiences that brings everyone closer together. 

As the 6th graders excitedly ran on to perform, a collective “aww” filled the gym. With matching class hoodies, the 6th graders performed to the theme song of Charlie Brown and “who let the dogs out” with a fun dance circle. “airband helped my class work together and we had a great time,” JoJo Hu (‘29) said, “it definitely was a 10/10 for me because we all got to see upper schoolers do their best and enjoy the moment.” 

The seventh graders followed this amazing performance with one of their own. Alexa Guss (‘28) explained, “The theme we decided to do was sort of a mix of things you could say….we sort of compromised and decided to go with a super bowl theme along with an Ice Spice song because most of the boys in the grade wanted someone to be her and lip sync to her song.” The seventh graders did a great job of hyping up the audience, and got a ton of laughs. Alexa explained, “We didn’t have the whole dance until like the day of, and it was a bit stressful figuring things out…but it ended up turning out to be fine, and airband was a really fun experience!” Anna Kaminsky (‘28) added, “I think everyone who participated in airband had a lot of fun and collaborated very well.” 

With a long banner and beach balls flying around, the 8th graders ended up winning airband with their unique performance. “Our theme was super bowl over the years, like most of the grades.” Amber Zhang (‘27) laughed, “I thought our performance was a pretty noticeable improvement from last year, and I thought some bits were pretty funny, like the Katy Perry part with the blue wig.” “This was definitely one of my favorites,” Sydney Mafong (‘26) said, “I really enjoyed their whole performance.” 

The 9th graders brought a twist into their performance, telling the audience that they weren’t going to participate again, just like last year. But rolling in with a piano and starting a basketball game with wigs on, the 9th graders got a ton of cheers and laughs from the audience. “This was a really unique and funny performance,” Sydney Mafong (‘26) said, “I really enjoyed watching it and I was happy there was a break from the halftime shows,” she laughed. 

Even though the theme of the super bowl was extremely popular throughout the grades, the 10th graders were able to make it entertaining for the whole school. “The 10th grade performance was definitely one of my favorites,” Yi Tu (‘24) explained, “I could tell they put in a ton of effort on the choreography and costumes, and it was super entertaining.” A member of the winning grade, 8th grader Amber Zhang added, “I will admit at first I was a little confused as to why the sophomores didn’t win.” Emma Donnelly (‘25) laughed, “considering how much effort we spent and how many people we got to participate I think the results stung a little bit at first. Especially since we all spent money on our costumes/ props and practiced almost everyday…but everyone I talked to that participated said they had such an amazing time and they can’t wait to come back better than ever next year and show everyone that we deserve to be in the top three.” 

Following the action packed 10th grade performance, was a unique solo from the juniors.  “Originally I was supposed to just organize the airband for the Junior class as their class president, but there was low participation,” Dylan Navarrete (‘24) explained. Yi Tu (‘24) added, “we have like no spirit…we were gonna do musical chairs, but we didn’t even have enough people for that.” Dylan wanted to make sure that the Junior class still had a great airband performance, so he decided to take it upon himself to create an amazing performance. “I learned the dance from the movie Napoleon Dynamite, and ordered the costume to complete the look.” Dylan explained, “the funny thing is that I decided to learn the dance a week before, and I learned the majority of the dance the night before….I watched so many Napoleon Dynamite clips that the song ‘canned heat’ was stuck in my head for days afterwards.” With help from the energy in the audience, and with a standing ovation, Dylan brought the juniors to 2nd place, when the juniors haven’t placed since they were in 6th. 

In third place, the seniors took on the theme modeled after “America’s got talent,” which included multiple acts which featured a teacher rap battle, dancing with the stars, and a golden buzzer act, where as many seniors as possible came down to perform the Rihanna halftime show. Katelyn Wang (‘23) explained, “As senior class president, I had to ensure that the seniors maxed out on spirit. Many seniors participated this year here at Bishops, because it’s our last year here, so why not go big?” A technical difficulty appeared in the middle of their performance, but the seniors optimistically pushed through, (literally) doing push-ups to entertain the younger grades while they waited. Katelyn concluded, “We spent hours putting airband together, but it was worth it. Learning sassy dances together, writing funky rap battle verses, and producing a golden-buzzer show formed amazing memories.” 

The controversy of the podium echoed for hours after the event, with 10th graders posting on Instagram “we were robbed!” Although many students would have much rather been at Brick and Bell with friends, it ended up being a great way to start spring break.